‘This morning I found a black-and-white photograph of my father at the back of the bureau drawer. He didn’t look like a liar. My mother, Ute, had removed the other pictures of him from the albums she kept on the bottom shelf of the bookcase, and shuffled around all the remaining family and baby snapshots to fill in the gaps. The framed picture of their wedding, which used to sit on the mantelpiece, had gone too.’

When Peggy is eight years old, her survivalist father takes her on a camping trip to a remote European forest. As the summer comes to an end, Peggy wants to go home. But her father tells her that the world beyond the forest is no more, and that they are the last two people left in the world.

Winner of the Desmond Elliott Prize 2015 and the Waterstones Book Club title of the year, this is one of those books I deliberately avoided because of all the praise it had received. Too often I find that this kind of book disappointing (I’m looking at you, The Miniaturist) because the rave reviews have raised my expectations too high. Fortunately, Our Endless Numbered Days is one of those books that is worth the hype.

The atmosphere in this book is superb. Fuller creates a creeping unease that lingers even when you put the book down. As soon as you do so, you’re desperate to pick it up again to find out what is going to happen to Peggy.

Peggy is a great protagonist. Resourceful and intelligent, we see her forced to grow up as she comes to terms with the fact that the world as she knew it has ended. The reader will empathise with her wholeheartedly as she is forced to deal with situations she simply does not understand. As the isolation of their cramped living quarters begins to create an unbearable sense of claustrophobia, the reader wonders how the story can possibly end well.

Fuller writes beautifully, conjuring the intimidating beauty of the landscape both in the first bloom of summer and the depths of a snowy winter. She teases you with hints of things to come but conjures such a disquieting sense of dread that you’re tempted to look away. At times quiet and bleak, at times bloody and brutal, this is a story of extremes.

The book does have a few flaws. The interjections from present-day Peggy looking back on when she was eight years old spoil the tension somewhat and detract from the main story. Fuller could have easily removed these sections and the book wouldn’t have lost anything. A few questions I had were also left unanswered, and I felt that the ending would have benefited from just a paragraph or two of further information.

Post-apocalyptic novels and films are undoubtedly overdone, but I guarantee you’ve never read one like this before.

Our Endless Numbered Days is published by Penguin.